curtis



PATENTED JAN. 12, 1904..

C. G. CURTIS. APPARATUS FOR GOVERNING ELASTIC FLUID TURBINES.

APPLICATION FILED JUNE 1'7, 1903. N0 MODEL. 3 SHEETS-SHEET 1.

Witnesses me Name. mllL-m m mmumwu wwwmoa, n c

PATENTED JAN. 12, 1904.

C. G. CURTIS. APPARATUS FOR GOVERNING ELASTIC FLUID TURBINES.

APPLICATION FILED JUNE 17 1903 3 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

N0 MODEL.

Witnesses Attom'eys No. 749,476. PATENTED JAN. 12, 1904. G G. CURTIS.

APPARATUS FOR GOVERNING ELASTIC FLUID TURBINES.

APPLIOATION IILED JUNE 17, 1903. N0 MODEL. 3 SHEETSSHEET 3.

Witnesses Inventor Hm'OJ mac, mswnsvon. n c

Patented January 12, 1904.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

CHARLES G. CURTIS, OF NEW YORK, N. Y.

APPARATUS FOR GOVERNING ELASTIC-FLUID TURBINES.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 749,476, dated January12, 1904. Application filed June 1'7, 1903. Serial No. 161,839. (Nomodel.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, OHARLns G. CURTIS, a citizen of the United States,residing in the borough of Manhattan, city of New York, State of NewYork, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Apparatusfor Governing Elastic-Fluid Turbines, of which the following is adescription.

The object I have in view is to produce means for automaticallygoverning a battery of elastic-fluid turbines, so as to maintain themost efficient conditions of operation of the turbines themselves and ofthe apparatus, such as dynamo-electric machines, which is driven bythem.

In carrying out the invention I provide as the controlling element ofthe apparatus a centrifugal governor, which may be mounted upon ordriven from the shaft of the first turbine of the battery, or in casethe turbines are used to drive alternating-current dynamoelectricmachines this centrifugal governor may be driven by a synchronous motorconnected with the bus-bars to which the dynamos are connected. Thiscentrifugal governor serves to open and close a valve admitting water,oil, or other suitable liquid to opposite ends of the cylinder, in whichmoves a piston, and the piston by its movement opens and closes directlyor indirectly and in proper order the valves controlling the supply ofelastic fluid to the turbines. These valves preferably control thesupply of the elastic fluid to sectional nozzles, such as are describedin my Patent No. 700,7t4, dated May 27, 1902, each valve by its openingadmitting the elastic fluid to a chamber with which one or more of thesections of the nozzle are connected, as described in my application,Serial No. 114:,357, filed July 5, 1902. The controlling-valves of theseveral turbines are operated by the governing apparatus, so as togovern the turbines progressively in the following manner: Enough of thevalves of the first turbine are opened in succession as the loadincreases to produce the full-load condition of the dynamo driven bythat turbine. As the load increases further the controlling-valves ofthe second turbine are openedsuccessively until the full-load conditionof the dynamo driven by that turbine is reached, and so on for thethird, fourth, and any greater number of turbines which the battery maycontain. After the full-load condition of all the dynamos of the batteryhas been reached the governing apparatus puts on part of the overload onthe first turbine and then successively on the other turbines of thebattery until all the dynamos are carrying the same amount of theoverload, when a further fraction of the overload is added, first to thefirst turbine and then to the second turbine, and so on, and thisoperation of adding the overload to the turbines in successionfractionally is repeated. until the full overload condition is reached.Instead of having the control of each turbine divided between a numberof valves, both for the full-load condition and for the overloadcondition, the number of valves for each turbine may be reduced and theregulation for each turbine made dependent to a greater extent upon thethrottling action of the valves. Indeed, this may be carried to theextent of providing only two valves for each turbine, one for thefull-load and one for the overload, each of these valves controlling theadmission of the elastic fluid to alarge number of sections of thesectional nozzle. In this case the governing apparatus will act to firstopen the full-load valve of the first turbine, depending upon thethrottling action of the valve at intermediate positions to control theturbine for less than full load. The governing apparatus will then inthe same manner open the full-load valve of the second turbine, and soon until the full-load valves of all the turbines of the battery areopen. For the overload the governing apparatus will apply the overloadfractionally to the turbines by first partially opening theoverload-valves of the turbines in succession and then returning to thefirst turbine and opening the overloadvalves in succession stillfurther, and so on until the overload-valves of all the turbines areentirely open. The loss in efficiency which will result from dependingupon the throttling action of the valves will not be very great in thecase of a battery containing a number of turbines, since the effectproduced by throttling will be for most of the time confined to a smallfraction of the whole effect.

In the accompanying drawings, forming a part hereof, Figure 1 is view,largely in diagram, illustrating an apparatus embodying my invention.Fig. 2 is a diagram illustrating more in detail the relative control ofthe full load and overload valves of the apparatus of Fig. 1, and Fig. 3is a view illustrating the employment of compressed air for operatingthe turbine-valves, and Fig. 4 is a view illustrating a governingapparatus of simpler form and with a single full-load and overload valvefor each turbine.

Referring particularly to Fig. 1, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 represent turbineunits, including elastic-fluid turbines and alternating-currentdynamo-electric machines, the dynamos being cennected by Wires 6 7 tothe bus-bars 8 9. 10 and 11 are magnets controlling the valves of theturbines. For simplicity of illustration only two of such magnets areshown in Fig. 1 for each turbine, the magnets 10 controlling thefull-load valves and the magnets 11 controlling the overload-valves; butsince each valve is either wholly opened or closed there will be anumber of valves for the full load and overload of each turbine, as willbe presently explained in connection with Fig. 2. The magnets 10 and 11are connected by separate wires 12 and 13 with the separatelyinsulatedcontacts 14 15, while a return-wire 16, common to all the magnets, isconnected With a plate 17 and includes a source of direct current 18. Acontact-plate 19, having a length equal to all of the contacts 14 15,slides over the contacts 14 15 and plate 17 The contact-plate 19 iscarried by a rod from a piston 20, which moves in a cylinder 21. Thepiston 20 is moved in one direction or the other by liquid underpressure admitted to opposite sides of the cylinder 21 and exhaustedtherefrom through suitable entrance and exhaust ports controlled by avalve 22. The valve 22 is moved by a centrifugal governor 23, which isdriven by a synchronous motor 24, connected by wires 25 26 with thebus-bars 8 9. ,As already suggested, the centrifugal governor 23 may bemounted on the shaft of the turbine 1.

It will be understood that the usual switches are placed in the severalcircuits for opening and closing them and also that the steam-supplypipes leading to the turbines will be provided with the usualthrottle-valves for turning on and off the steam. WVhen the turbines arenot running, these throttle-valves will be closed and the switches willbe opened, the piston 20 will stand at the left-hand end of the cylinder21, and. the plate 19 will cover all the contacts 14 15. To start up theplant, the circuit to the magnets 10 11 will be closed, thus opening allthe turbine-valves controlled by the various branches of that circuit.Steam will then be turned on the first turbine by opening its throttle.Vhen the dynamo operated by the turbine has acquired the proper speed,it will be connected with the bus-bars and the circuit to thesynchronous motor will also be closed. The motor will at once acquirethe speed of the dynamo and will operate the centrifugal governor, whichwill move the valve 22 to the right and cause the piston 20 to move tothe right until the contact-plate 19 covers the proper number ofcontacts 14 15. If the load is greater than the capacity of the firstdynamo, the throttles of one or more of the other turbines will beopened. Preferably at least one turbine in addition to that required tocarry the load should have its throttle opened, so as to be ready toinstantly respond to any sudden increase in load, and, indeed, thethrottles of all the turbines of the battery may be opened irrespectiveof the amount of load. Such of the turbines as are not receiving steamthrough the valves controlled by the magnets 10 and 11 will be run asmotors by current from the bus-bars, or, if desired, each turbine mayhave a nozzle which is always open when the throttleis open and withsufficient capacity to turn the turbine and dynamo and produce anelectromotive force which will approximately balance the electromotiveforce of the bus-bars.

Assuming that the throttles of all the turbines are open and that allthe dynamos are connected with the bus-bars and are turning, theoperation of the governing apparatus will be as follows, starting with alight load on the first dynamo: It is assumed that contact-plate 19rests only on the contact 14 at the extreme right, thus opening thefull-load valve of the first turbine. As the load is increased the firstdynamo will reduce in speed, and this will cause the synchronous motorto reduce in speed, causing the governor 23 to move the valve 22 to theleft, opening the right-hand end of the cylinder 21 to theliquid-pressure and the left-hand end of that cylinder to the exhaust.The piston 20 will be moved slowly to the left, drawing thecontact-plate 19 upon the second contact 14 and opening the fullloadvalve of the second turbine. This will cause the second turbine and thedynamo driven by it to take a part of the load, and the synchronousmotor will regain its speed and will move the valve 22 to a centralposition, covering both DIGSSLHG-POItS to the cylinder. As the loadfurther increases a similar sequence of operations will take place, andthe contact-plate 19 will be drawn farther to the left, covering insuccession the contacts 14, connected with the full-load valves of thethird and subsequent turbines. A still further increase of load willcause a continued movement of the contact-plate 19 to the left, so thatit will cover in succession the contacts 15 and will successively openthe overloadvalves of the several turbines. The reverse operation takesplace as the load decreases.

As illustrated in Fig. 2, each turbine is provided with four magnets 10for controlling the full load of the turbine and three magnets 11 forcontrolling the overload of the turbine.-

The wires 12 and 13, running from the fullload and overload magnets 10and 11 to the contacts 14 15, are so arranged, as illustrated in Fig. 2,that the four full-load magnets 10 of the turbine 1 are first energizedsuccessively, then the four full-load magnets 10 of the second turbine,and so on throughout all the turbines of the battery. After all theturbines are operating on the full load the over load is appliedfractionally to the turbines in succession by first closing the circuitto the first overload-magnets 11 of the several turbines successivelyand then successively to the second overload-magnets of the severalturbines, and so on.

In Fig. 3 the employment of compressed air for operating the valves isillustrated instead of electrical energy. The pipes 27 for carrying theair-pressure to the valves are connected with compartments 28, whichhave valveopenings leading into the pressure-box 29. Valves 30 close theopenings between the separate compartments 28 and the pressure-box 29.These valves are closed by springs and are retracted by a cam-slide 31,which is carried by the rod from the piston 20, this piston beingoperated as already described. The valves 30 in closing operate in amanner well understood to open vents in the pipes 27, so as to releasethe pressure in such pipes when they are disconnected from thepressure-box 29.

As illustrated in Fig. 4, the turbine-valves are operated directly by amovement of the piston 20 through a cam-rod 32, connected with thepiston. This figure also illustrates the arrangement wherein eachturbine is provided with only a single full-load valve 33 and a sin gleoverload-valve 34. The inclines upon the cam-rod 32 are so formed andcoordinated that the full-load valves 33 of the several turbines wil beopened in succession, each valve being opened gradually and acting tothrottle the elastic fluid when partially open. The fullload valves areopened by the inclines 35, carried by the rod 32. Other inclines 36 areem ployed to open the overload-valves. These inclines 36 are preferablyso coordinated that after the full-load valves of all the turbines areopen the overload-valves of the several turbines will be opened insuccession fractionally as, for instance, the overload-valve of theturbine 1 will be open only part way when the overload-valve of theturbine 2 will begin to open, and before the overload-valve of theturbine 1 is wholly open the overload-valve of the last turbine of thebattery will begin to open.

V hat I claim is 1. The combination with abattery of elasticfluidturbines, of an automatically-acting governor controlling the turbinesin succession, substantially as set forth.

2. The combination with a battery of elasticfluid turbines, of anautomatic governor acting to apply the full load to the turbines insuccession, substantially as set forth.

3. The combination with a battery of elasticfluid turbines, of anautomatic governor acting to apply the overload to the turbines insuccession, substantially as set forth.

4:. The combination with a battery of elasticfluid turbines, of anautomatic governor acting to apply the full load to the turbines insuccession and to apply the overload to the turbines in succession afterall the turbines have receivedthe full load, substantially as set forth.

5. The combination with abattery of elasticfiuid turbines, of anautomatic governor acting to apply the overload to the turbines insuccession fractionally, substantially as set forth.

6. The combination with a battery of elasticfluid turbines, of anautomatic governor acting to apply the full load to the turbines insuccession and to subsequently apply the overload to the turbines insuccession fractionally, substantially as set forth.

7. The combination with a battery of turbines, of a centrifugal governorwhose speed is synchronous with the speed of the turbines, a powerdevice controlled by said governor, and connections from said powerdevice to the valves of the turbines for controlling the turbines insuccession, substantially as set forth.

8. The combination with abattery of elasticfluid-turbine units includingalternating-current dynamos, of a synchronous motor driven by thecurrent from said dynamos, a speedgovernor driven by said motor, a powerdevice controlled by said speed-governor, and connections from saidpower device to the valves of the dynamos for controlling the turbines,substantially as set forth.

This specification signed and witnessed this 8th day of June, 1903.

CHARLES G. CURTIS.

Witnesses:

JNo. Roar. TAYLOR, JOHN LoUIs Lorsorr.

